Texas House Bill 2649 is going up for vote in the state Senate tomorrow and needs your immediate action!

2649 make it impossible for lighting designers who work in Texas to work on projects without being licensed as either an electrician, architect, engineer, landscape architect, or interior designer. If Texas passes this bill, there will probably be more bills just like this in other states. Read more at Jim on Light.

I am writing to urge you to vote NO on HB 2649. HB 2649 has been drafted without any input from lighting designers, and restricts the practice of lighting design to members of other professions and trades, such as architects, engineers and electricians. There are no provisions in the legislation for establishing a licensing standard for lighting designers.

I have a personal investment in this bill. My husband is a Lighting Designer. He is a professional in his craft, having received a Masters in Lighting Design from The Ohio State University and soon to receive a Masters in Architectural Lighting from KTH in Sweden. Additionally, he has taught lighting design as an Assistant Professor at the University of Texas at Arlington. He is also a member of the United Scenic Artists union, having had his professional credentials evaluated by his peers.

All of these accolades, education and experience will mean nothing if this bill passes. He is not an architect, interior designer, or engineer. He is a small business owner who provides Lighting Design consultation and services. He will be out of business if this bill passes.

Please consider the economic impact of this legislation. Professional, practicing Lighting Designers in Texas will be out of work.

I need your help, music fans. I’m thinking of a song, but can’t place it.

female-sounding voice, who sounds kind of like the lead singer of The Cranberries

driving beat

may or may not contain lyrics including “with you” and “told me” (very helpful, I know)

The beginning of the Arcade Fire’s “Rebellion (Lies)” makes me think of this song. Every time it comes up in my playlist, I think to myself, “HEY, self, it’s that cool song!” but it isn’t. Here’s “Rebellion (Lies)” for reference:

The blog is back, out of its subdirectory (probably ruining 9 years worth of SEO), and now powered by WordPress! I’ve been meaning to do this for a while, but a recent spate of boredom made it happen. Some day I’ll get the happy glasses girl icon back into the design, but for now it is rocking one of the default themes Dreamhost installs with WP.

I’ll be slowly working the old static content back in, and making it more mine, but this is the official re-start.

I’m blogging from my iPhone which probably isn’t smart because I still dong type very well on it. I’m blogging from
my iPhone whj b isn’t very smart because I still font type wesll in it. I’m. Logging from my iPhone which isn’t. Sry smart because I still font type very well in it.

I’ll be heading down to Dallas Wednesday night to put in a couple of days at the office and co-host a baby shower this weekend. All concerned parties should know I will be bringing the chocolate fountain.

I also need to burn up some unused massages at Massage Envy — Oklahoma City knows not of its wonders.

Oops. I stayed away from the computer yesterday, but forgot I needed to blog. I’ll blog twice today to make up for it.

Friday night, we had dinner at our next door neighbors’. They also invited another new couple in town and the couple that lives across the street. We all had a great time, eating and drinking too much.

It’s nice to finally make some new friends here. Being new to town and working from home, I haven’t really met many people. I’m hoping that is starting to change. This month, there’s a MetaFilter Meetup and there’s supposed to be a RefreshOKC meeting, so I’m thinking I’ll get to meet a few more web nerds like myself.

Well, I aimed to blog every day for a year earlier this year, and we see how well that went. Maybe a smaller target is better. I’m going to try out this NaBloPoMo thing, mostly because it has three syllables that rhyme. Or, as Jim just said, “NaBloPoMo, MoFo!” Away we go.

Saturday we made a quick one-day turnaround trip up to Oklahoma City to look for a house to rent. We’d decided to rent so we could take time to make sure that we like the city, Jim likes his job, and we have time to find a neighborhood that is convenient for work and activities. We also thought we’d stop giving our money to Lowe’s so much. What we didn’t know was that the OKC house rental situation is awful.

$725 would get you a 3 bedroom with 1 bathroom that stunk of cat pee

$800 would get you a place that had great space, but was last updated in 1970, carpets and appliances included

$850 would get you a house that needs a new pier in the foundation, and is cracked from floor to ceiling in the living room, plus the hot water constantly runs in the bathtub

Now you Californians and New Yorkers might think that these prices are great, but they are not down here! You can pay a mortgage on a good house here with those sorts of monthly payments. So, we crunched some numbers, and it looks like we’re better off buying again.